If the City of Burnaby adopts a bylaw banning hookah lounges, one business owner says she would be out a $2-million investment and on the hook for a 10-year lease.
While the issue of second-hand smoke has been the primary reason for banning smoking indoors, Pascal Berro said that’s not an issue with a hookah lounge.
In August 2019, Berro opened the Living Room Café, a lounge in which patrons can smoke hookah, a fruit-flavoured molasses mixture, through a water pipe.
She said 90% of her revenue comes from the product, which comes from some Middle Eastern and South Asian cultures.
“Without it, we would be forced into bankruptcy. We have a 10-year lease; I pay $15,000 a month in rent,” Berro told council. “We also have business loans and debts with personal guarantees. Who will be responsible for this? How will I recover from this? How will we all recover from this?”
With 11 hookah lounges operating in Burnaby, Berro estimated there are likely 110 employees reliant on the businesses for their income. Those employees, she noted, could lose their jobs in a pandemic if a hookah lounge ban is passed.
The pandemic, too, has affected her ability to pay back the loans she’s used to open the business, with the lounge only at half-capacity since it reopened.
Before she opened the Living Room Café, she said she consulted with city officials who said the lounge would be fine to operate under a restaurant licence.
“My business licence states that I will be serving hookah,” Berro said, noting that she can’t change her business into a restaurant - as one city official had suggested to her - because she was not allowed to add a commercial kitchen by the city due to the venting system. “At that time (of opening), it was not my concern because we were not opening a restaurant, but a hookah lounge.”
In order to meet city requirements, Berro said she invested $200,000 in ventilation for the business.
Berro said she felt the city was unfairly targeting hookah for noise complaints at other lounges in the city.
“Why should all hookah lounges suffer due to the mistake of others?” Berro asked. “If a sushi bar violates a bylaw, do you just close that one sushi restaurant, or do you close them all because of one establishment’s mistake?”
Berro pointed out her business has not been the subject of any noise complaints or any other issues, including compliance with COVID-19-related rules.
The issue of hookah lounge bans is particularly important, Berro noted, because it’s a significant part of some Middle East and South Asian cultures.
“You will be taking our culture away from us. COVID has brought enough people and families suffering. This will make problems worse,” she said.
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